Battle Zone

"I dropped my gift card somewhere in Target. We have to go back," boyfriend admitted in the car.

"Are you kidding me? I told you to put it in my purse so it would stop falling out of your pocket!"

"I know, but I figured after the tenth time it fell out it would stop doing it," he said, his smarts obviously out of my range of knowledge.

This was fine. I needed to go back to Target anyway. I needed to go to the bathroom and I wasn't going to sit comfortably all the way back to my house.

I needed to go two-sie.

Two-fer.

Poop.

We staggered into Target for a second time that evening (earlier I was buzzed off Uinta's Yard Sale Winter Lager and needed to walk it off) and I veered into the bathroom.

I don't understand why, but this Target always keeps it's bathroom freezing. The air is brisk. The water is practically ice. Even the air dryer shoots out arctic winds to dry your hands. Maybe you're supposed to get your blood pumping first with heavy duty shopping and cart pushing so you're prepared to venture into the frigid whiz palace?

I bent over, doing a shoe-check to make sure I was alone in the bathroom. Alas, there they were. A pair of brown suede boots. God dammit, seriously? I can't drop the kids off if someone is there with me. I go into a stall, figuring she's almost done.

I sat there, doing the mentally straining task of clenching one direction and releasing the other. You know, peeing while flexing. She was just...sitting there.

So, I just sat there as well.

And we sat there. Together. Waiting for the other person to leave.

I NEEDED TO TAKE A SHIT. I was in the middle of a shit cold war, and no one was budging.

Fine, I thought to myself, I'm going to go frickin' Poland on your ass and create a movement to "create a movement" elsewhere. GOOD DAY TO YOU.

I left, taking extra time at the air dryer to give her the cover-noise so she could "get going."

Why does this happen, ladies? Why does this happen so frequently? This is not the first time I've sat down for ages thinking, "god dammit shit or get off the can." Can't we poop together? Why do we sit on the toilet for what feels like hours, waiting for the other person to leave? We're all in this together, it's not like I wander into the bathroom, notice you're there too and say, "oh my Gorbachev what is someone else doing in here?"

Maybe one of my new year resolutions should be to get over this common poop space anxiety. Shoot the shit. So to speak.

Filter This

My brain might be broken. I think it's been this way since I was a child.

I called my store's other location today and heard, "speak of the devil," in the background.

"Are you guys talking about me?"

"Yes."

"Why? What could you possibly have to say about me?"

"We're just talking about how sometimes you don't have a filter," she half laughed into the phone.

"What? F*** you, I do too have a filter!" I yelled, clearly making their case.

Another perfect example of this is the racist-comment incident of 2006. It was my junior year of high school and I was taking a psychology class. My mom was going off one day about the "brown out", a day when all the Hispanics in the area were going on strike, so no one would be working in the kitchen at her restaurant. We were discussing the strike in class, and the teacher asked us a question about what they were calling the strike.

"Oh, you mean the brown out?" I blurted.

"Uh. Yeah," he responded, uncomfortable. I began to shrink in my chair, humiliated. It was only in this moment that I realized how racist this comment actually was. I still cringe when I tell this story.

Other instances that prove I'm a little bit special:
-I named our black cat Whitey.
-I named our white cat Tiger (I was into golf apparently?).
-I did theater in high school.
-I confused Simba with Johnathan Taylor Thomas and told people I had a "literal" crush on Simba.
-I used to chant, "TWO FOUR SIX EIGHT WHO DO WE ILLUMINATE?"
-Take Ring Around the Rosy and replace "we all fall down," with "EVERYBODY DANCE NOW." I thought I was a lyrical genius. I also thought the word "dance" was "down," so, you know, you can see where I thought it was appropriate.

The X in X-mas

This year is the first year I am actually celebrating Christmas as a goddamn adult. Sure, I was 21 last year, and technically I could have been doing what I wanted since I was 18. 2011 is the year I actually take charge and celebrate whatever the hell I feel like celebrating.

So far, I have celebrated watching Christmas cable movies and not indulging in sweets. My body is a machine, and it functions on portion control and romantic comedies where girls ask Santa for a boyfriend. Possibly my favorite movie so far was a little Hallmark gem called The Case for Christmas, in which Dean Cain (!) is a lawyer who represents Santa in court because Santa is being sued (!!). I want to meet the person who sat down to actually write that script and had the balls to turn it into a movie.

I downloaded A Very She & Him Christmas and Michael Buble's album. Which, let me tell you something, Michael Buble is obviously not trying very hard on this one. It's like someone said, "hey, you know you could make a shit-ton of money if you recorded a Christmas mix" and 20 minutes in the studio later, an iTunes #1 album was born (seriously, it's #1 while Black Keys is #2. A TRAVESTY). I listen to these on repeat. Boyfriend won't allow Christmas music in the car because it's all he hears at work. When I'm driving by myself, my car is a frickin' Christmas wonderland.

Bigger than my Dean Cain Christmas and faux-joy Buble, this is my first Christmas after coming to terms with whatever my beliefs are. I may not see Christmas for what it's supposed to be about, so I'm trying to appreciate the spirit of it. Or whatever. I had an astounding summer in which I looked deep within myself and tried to figure out just what I believe in , and let me tell you Christmas after that is hard.

So to everyone, I wish you a merry Christmas, a happy holiday, and I hope you enjoy my agnostic cupcakes when I get around to baking them.

Foo Fighters Review

I am a grown up! Sometimes, I get the opportunity to see a band I really like and my dad will ask me to write a review for his newspaper's website. Last night I saw the Foo Fighters. IT. WAS. AMAZING. I am biased, because I kind of really really really really love the Foo Fighters.

Anyway, it was very cool to see my ramblings on the City Weekly website, along with really cool pictures.

You can see my review here.

Back To My Roots

I will be straightforward with you. I am terrified.

I have not written for myself in quite a long time. I have not been creative in years (YEARS!) and I am on the brink of beginning something so new to me that I'm unsure if I want to make the leap.

It's not that I'm insanely busy (I am) or untalented (I'm not), I'm just...nervous.

I need to take that anxiety and turn it into something beautiful. It's time to take this story I've had in my head since I was 13 and finally commit it to writing.

I feel like if I announce it here, then I will have motivation to keep it going.

(I'm wasting time here. Procrastinating, if you will.)

Spoiler Alert

Doodles from my new jobby job